Detroit cemetery flooded, filled with holes for Mother's Day visit

DETROIT (WJBK) - A family hoping to pay respect to their late mother on Mother's Day was shocked by the condition of the cemetery when they arrived.

Michael Wilson and his family were visiting Gethsemane Cemetery, near the Detroit City Airport. They just held the funeral for his mother, Lori Ann Wilson, last weekend.

But this weekend they pulled up to see a flooded cemetery -- and not even a site yet dedicated to their loved one.

"I feel bad for her boys. This is their first Mother's Day without their mom and they don't have anywhere to come give her flowers, pay any type of respect because they are literally looking at a sunken hole," said Donna Panyek.

It's more like a pothole in a dirt road, right now, because the family says where Lori Ann was buried used to be a road in the cemetery. And, apparently, people are still using it as such. FOX 2 saw it firsthand.

The family says they spent over $7,000 for the burial and funeral. They say they paid with the understanding that, by Mother's Day, they would have a place to come and visit. But they didn't expect their loved one to be laid to rest in these conditions.

It appears they're not alone, either.

"How do you take up a road to bury more people? I just don't understand that," said a loved one who was at the cemetery.

They say they do understand, though, that space in a cemetery is limited. They say what would make this right would be to simply make it clear that this is no longer a road, and is now a final resting place for loved ones. The few cones that are out there now aren't working.

When they took their concerns to management Sunday, they said they were told the cemetery was closed and they'd have to come back Monday.

FOX 2 also tried to reach out to management but were also told we'd have to try back later.